Special Guest: David Howard.

FirstDay Cottage: Kit Homes,

building your future.

A FirstDay Cottage is a house kit with a unique building system designed specifically for people who want to build themselves a home. FirstDay Cottages require few tools, are tolerant to error and are strong and elegant. Building a FirstDay Cottage is a lot of work and takes a significant commitment, but once complete can earn you valuable sweat equity and a new home. FirstDay Cottage has been helping people build themselves a home for over 20 years and now has over 250 houses in more than 30 states and two foreign countries. We are now featuring our new designs for the Single-Story T house, which builds off all that we have learned about owner-built housing in the last 20 years of FirstDay Cottage.

Meet David Howard:

David, in his career as an architect, has designed over 400 buildings in 38 states. He’s designed and manufactured timber frame residential and commercial buildings.  In the mid eighties, David began to focus more on residential design and he started pursuing his dream – the design and development of new villages. One major motivation for developing FirstDay was for a way to “get school teachers into our new villages for half the price”. The first new village, for which David contributed the conceptual design, was constructed on Nantucket Island. These days, David continues to do the major design work for FirstDay while actively pursuing the creation of new villages. He still does occasional work as a residential designer, and is also working on the development of a few books on architecture as well as other subjects.

Click for Brochure:

What is a FirstDay Cottage?
• An elegant, durable and energy-efficient all-wood house.
• A house kit specifically designed for owner-builders that a pair can build with few tools.
• A customized house design to fit the specific needs of each customer.
Why Should I Build a FirstDay Cottage?
• Finally live in a house that you own with a design and materials you can believe in.
• Increase your personal equity. Your hard work can add significant sweat equity to your personal wealth.
• Feel a sense of accomplishment. Be satisfied by the successful completion of a difficult, highly rewarding project.
• Impress your friends (and in-laws). Build yourself a home!
Can I Build a FirstDay Cottage?
• A wide variety of people have successfully built FirstDays. FirstDay Cottages have been built by everyone from twenty something school teachers with children to seventy year old retirees. If you have the determination and a solid plan, you can build one.
• FirstDay is serious about supporting you to make the project a success. We encourage all our customers to contact us frequently to get advice and support throughout the project so that we can help you get the project done and done right.
• FirstDays can be adapted to meet local codes. FirstDay Cottage’s have been built all over the country. FirstDay will work with you to make sure your house will meet local codes.